


Trial and Error

by Sandrine Shaw (Sandrine)



Category: Pawns and Symbols - Majliss Larson, Star Trek - Various Authors
Genre: Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-11-17
Updated: 2008-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-31 08:08:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/341848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandrine/pseuds/Sandrine%20Shaw
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From the moment she steps on Federation soil, it feels wrong: familiar but distorted and disconcerting, like the figures on an abstract Haliian painting. It's as if she's back where she started only to find that the place had changed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trial and Error

When Kang finally sets her free and she and Aernath settle on Sherman's planet, more than two years after the earthquake that got her into this mess to begin with, Jean thinks that the hard part is over. She's at home and safe and loved, and she knows she's earned this chance to start over. Doesn't mean that she's ready for it.

From the moment she steps on Federation soil, it feels wrong: familiar but distorted and disconcerting, like the figures on an abstract Haliian painting. It's as if she's back where she started only to find that the place had changed. It hasn't, of course: it's her who's been changed. She's hyperaware of everyone's looks on her that seem to mark her as an outsider, the whispers behind her back that follow her wherever she goes. The food is oddly tasteless and the bed is too soft and the air condition feels always a few degrees too cold.

 _It'll just take some time to get used to it again_ , she tells herself. _It will pass in a few days,_ and later, _Give it a couple of weeks. It'll be okay._

But it doesn't pass, and it's not okay. Not after a few days or a few weeks or two months. If anything, it gets worse. She's short-tempered and touchy and so frustrated that she wants to cry. Ironically, no one would really disapprove of her having a breakdown here. Sure, they'd sent her to see a therapist and have her talk about it, but they wouldn't think less of her. The idea should probably be reassuring, except it's not; it only serves to make her feel more acutely aware that she doesn't fit in anymore.

Her relationship with Aernath gets strained and she knows it's her fault. He's been doing this for her, leaving his home behind to be with her. So if he's settling in well, if he's not having problems adjusting to their new situation, she should be grateful. Instead, she irrationally begrudges him for adapting where she can't and for not understanding _why_ she can't.

It takes her more than half a year to admit that it's not working out. 

Half a year of smiling fake smiles and telling everyone who asks that she will be fine. Half a year of telling herself the same thing, before she realizes that she's not ever going to be fine here. She's not going to magically turn back into the same person she was when the Klingons took her. If she's honest with herself, she doesn't want to be that person any more.

On a routine check-in, Kirk asks her how she's doing, and she takes a deep breath and says, "I want to— I _need_ to go back."

He frowns at her, and she knows that he's just about to say that it's not that simple, that she's a human and a Starfleet officer and that she can't just decide to walk out into enemy territory because she feels like it. And she knows that he'd be right, but... well, it really is not that simple. 

"I can't stay here. I'm sorry," she adds, just when he opens his mouth to speak. 

_I wish I could, but I tried my best and it's not working out, and I think after everything, I don't deserve this_ , is what she doesn't say, but maybe Kirk can read the words in her expression, because the speech how it doesn't work like that never comes. He looks at her long and hard, and finally – after she made an effort of holding his gaze and not shifting under his scrutiny – he nods.

"I'll see what I can do." 

Then, after a moment's pause, he asks, "Are you absolutely certain this is what you want, Lieutenant? If this works, there'll be no going back. You'll be on your own there. You have to be sure."

She smiles a little. "I am."


End file.
